Benefit fraud

Housing benefit and council tax support are available to people on low incomes to help towards paying their rent and/or council tax.

Benefit cheats are people who knowingly claim benefits they are not entitled to, who give false information or do not tell us when their circumstances change. People who claim benefit when they are not entitled are committing a criminal offence.

What is benefit fraud?

People are committing fraud when they

• work but do not declare this;

• claim as a single person but live with their partner or non dependants;

• do not declare their full amount of income, earnings, capital or ownership of another property when they claim benefit;

• claim from an address they do not live at;

• do not promptly advise of a change in their circumstances.

How to report benefit fraud

If you suspect that somebody is claiming a benefit falsely:

• please on line referral form or

• contact Benefit Section Investigation Team, PO Box 68, Manchester, M26 2YJ - our contact details are at the top right hand corner of this page.

We do not expect you to have all the evidence we require but the more information you can give us would make it easier for us to investigate the allegation.

For example if you suspect somebody has a partner living with them that we are not aware of and that the partner works we would like to know:

• the partners name, all or part of it or a description;

• place of work/ type of work, do they wear a uniform;

• time they leave or return to the house, do they use the front or back door, are they picked up;

• if they have a car, what type and the registration;

• how long they have been at the property;

• have the couple had any children together, what are their names

But if all you know is that "Miss Bloggs of 24 Something Street has a partner who lives with her and goes out to work" we still need to know this.

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